So Obama, how’s that dialogue thing going?
Obama is annoyed that his magic touch has failed to instantly fix a 60-year-old problem area of the world, Israel and Palestine. Oh, those silly children! Why can’t they all just get along?:
Bristling with impatience, President Barack Obama sternly prodded Israeli and Palestinian leaders to relaunch Mideast peace negotiations Tuesday, grasping a newly personal role in their historic standoff. He won an awkward, stone-faced handshake but no other apparent progress beyond a promise to talk about more talks.
But, after all, isn’t talking about more talking what Obama does best?
“This is only the beginning of the reckoning. This is only the first sip, the first foretaste of a bitter cup which will be proffered to us year by year unless by a supreme recovery of moral health and martial vigour, we arise again and take our stand for freedom as in the olden time.” Churchill talking about munich
In my memory, these allegations:
GWB brusquely insults our allies and therefore stifles diplomacy
began as a political tactic during the Kerry 2004 campaign for President.
Rightly or wrongly, I never believed John Kerry believed the allegations. Rightly or wrongly, I never believed any serious person believed U.S. diplomacy was stifled b/c of GWB’s alleged brusque style. Maybe parts of an ignorant electorate believed it; maybe parts of the ignorate left believed it. I didn’t see anyone else who would believe it.
However, for some time, it has appeared to me as if Barack Obama truly believed GWB’s brusque style stifled U.S. diplomatic progress. Barack, amazingly, believed the campaign tactic bull@#$%, and is now shocked that his own enlightened rejecting of the politics of divisiveness is not producing results.
Worse, that’s not the only amazing lie Barack believes. His knowledge of history amounts to knowledge of leftist propaganda about what allegedly happened but did not actually happen.
Repeating Samuel Clemens:
The most dangerous man is the one who doesn’t know what he doesn’t know.
“But, after all, isn’t talking about more talking what Obama does best?”
Yes but mostly about himself.
I hope ∅bama will change.
He needs more knowledge, experience and should do more due diligence with respect to learning about history, economics, science (physics and chemistry – for energy and climate issues) and biology.
As a 39 year old who had run a business, and studied a number of issues, I KNOW I could do a better job than ∅bama.
But – it isn’t about ∅bama. His line of reasoning reverberates throughout the lazy leftist well-meaning but poor policy crowd.
At some point – people begin to ask, “Is Obama well-meaning?”
Gray believes that you can figure out what Obama will do by figuring out what will cause the most human misery – that’s what Obama will do.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions… but do you really have good intentions if you continue the laziness with no regard for alternative points of view – dismissing them all of your life?
I recommend the new Victor David Hansen article. It explains Obama’s confusing traits as being the product of his immersion in leftist academia, and its culture.
Heres a clip:
In the world of the university, a Van Jones – fake name, fake accent, fake underclass pedigree, fake almost everything – is a dime a dozen. Ward Churchill fabricated everything from his degree to his ancestry, and was given tenure, high pay, and awards for his beads, buckskin, and Native American—like locks. The “authentic” outbursts of Van Jones about white polluters and white mass-murderers are standard campus fare. In universities, such over-the-top rhetoric and pseudo-Marxist histrionics are simply career moves, used to scare timid academics and win release time, faculty-adjudicated grants, or exemption from normal tenure scrutiny. Skip Gates’s fussy little theatrical fit at a Middle American was not his first and will not be his last.
Heres another:
Some wonder where Obama got the idea that constant exposure results in persuasion. But that too comes from the talk-is-everything mindset of a university president. Faculties are swamped with memos from deans, provosts, and presidents, reiterating their own “commitment to diversity,” reminding how they would not “tolerate hate speech,” and in general blathering about the “campus community.” University administrators instruct faculty on everything from getting a flu shot, to covering up when coughing, to how to make a syllabus and avoid incorrect words.
Gray believes that you can figure out what Obama will do by figuring out what will cause the most human misery – that’s what Obama will do.
Yes. In any circumstance, he will do whatever causes the most human misery right now. He’ll raise the hopes of the Wicked at the expense of the Good and then dash the hopes of the Wicked and squander the wealth of the Good anyhow.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions… but do you really have good intentions if you continue the laziness with no regard for alternative points of view – dismissing them all of your life?
You’re assuming he can recognize the existance of a viewpoint other than his own. He cannot. How can he dismiss other viewpoints if they don’t even exist in his world?
In the world of Obama’s mind: He intends it, therefore it is good.
According to a study of public high school students in Oklahoma:
Only 28 percent of the students were able to identify the U.S. Constitution as the supreme law of the land.
Only 26 percent knew that the Constitution’s first 10 amendments are called the Bill of Rights.
Only 29 percent knew that the president is in charge of the executive branch.
Only 23 percent knew that George Washington was the first president..
We’re not talking about analyzing the Federalist Papers here, folks. This is grade school stuff.
http://www.americancivicliteracy.org/
Of the 2,508 Americans taking ISI’s civic literacy test, 71% fail. Nationwide, the average score on the test is only 49%. The vast majority cannot recognize the language of Lincoln’s famous speech.
only .8 percent got an A…
of course everyone thinks they are in that .8% or the 2.6% with a B…
Only 54% can correctly identify a basic
description of the free enterprise system, in
which all Americans participate.
Thirty percent of elected officials do not
know that “life, liberty, and the pursuit of
happiness” are the inalienable rights referred
to in the Declaration of Independence.
Only 24% of college graduates know the
First Amendment prohibits establishing an
official religion for the United States.
Fewer than half of all Americans can name
all three branches of government, a minimal
requirement for understanding America’s
constitutional system.
The survey revealed that in today’s technological
age, all else remaining equal, a person’s test
score drops in proportion to the time he or she spends using certain types of passive electronic media. Talking on the phone, watching owned or rented movies, and monitoring TV news broadcasts and documentaries diminish a respondent’s civic literacy.
Only 21% know that the phrase “government
of the people, by the people, for the
people” comes from Lincoln’s Gettysburg
Address.
Although Congress has voted twice in the
last eight years to approve foreign wars, only
53% know that the power to declare war
belongs to Congress. Almost 40% incorrectly
believe it belongs to the president.
Only 55% know that Congress shares authority
over U.S. foreign policy with the
president. Almost a quarter incorrectly believe
Congress shares this power with the
United Nations.
Less than one in five know that the phrase
“a wall of separation” between church and
state comes from a letter by Thomas Jefferson.
Almost half incorrectly believe it can
be found in the Constitution.
Only 54% of college graduates correctly define
free enterprise as a system in which individual
citizens create, exchange, and control
goods and services. Thirteen percent believe
it is a system in which demand and supply
are decided through majority vote.
Thirty-two percent of college graduates
falsely believe the president has the power
to declare war.
Eighteen percent of college graduates cannot
name a single right or freedom guaranteed
by the First Amendment.
Only 24% of college graduates know that
the main issue in the Lincoln—Douglas
debates was whether slavery should be allowed
to expand into new territories.
[so is it any wonder they dont know that the kkk was the violent arm of the democratic party?]
Named Abdul as a judge on American Idol 56%
Recognized phrase from Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address 21%
Interestingly, the analysis also discovered that
people who do better on the civic literacy test also do better financially, even when holding constant their educational attainment.
[which means the dumbing down is self fulfilling]
Almost 90% know “life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness” are the inalienable
rights referred to in the Declaration. But only 34% know Aristotle and Aquinas
would concur in the basic principle that
“certain permanent moral and political
truths are accessible to human reason.”
which easily explains why Dawkins missibve on religion made such a big hit. he was arguing against aquinas, and other much bigger better thinkers, but he forgot to invite them to the discussion. so the majority thought dawkins was the only answers.
one of the BEST parts of the report is on page 18…
ARe you smarte than a politician…
in almost all but 4 questions the public is better informed.
that means out leaders know even less than we do what makes this cuontry great. (and teh questios about russia and declaration of indepence showed the largest gaps!)
here are some results of our elected ones.
so anointed they are dumber than us!
Seventy-nine percent of those who have
been elected to government office do not
know the Bill of Rights expressly prohibits
establishing an official religion for the U.S.
Thirty percent do not know that “life, liberty,
and the pursuit of happiness” are the
inalienable rights referred to in the Declaration
of Independence.
Twenty-seven percent cannot name even
one right or freedom guaranteed by the
First Amendment.
Forty-three percent do not know what the
Electoral College does. One in five thinks it
either “trains those aspiring for higher political
office” or “was established to supervise
the first televised presidential debates.”
Fifty-four percent do not know the Constitution
gives Congress the power to declare
war. Thirty-nine percent think that power
belongs to the president, and 10% think it
belongs to the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Only 32% can properly define the free enterprise system, and only 41% can identify
business profit as “revenue minus expenses.”
the point here is you can talk all ya want about obama… but thats only cause you all self selected in whom you converse with.
the VAST majority wouldnt know that they were in a commnuist state even if stalkn himself knocked on the door and ordered derzinsky himself to grab them, and beria to “find the crime” for the man.
by the way..
anyone notice that we are all still trying to find the REASONABLE answer that explains it all OTHER than he is a communist and communism isnt dead.
we are all searching for the peice of information that we can incorporate into our personal reality that will make it all ok.
guess what? this hasnt worked as a way to preserve the nation state we have all grown to love and the world has benifited from.
and it still aint working…
by the way… want to see how far it doesnt work?
you can still pull up recent articles of people still trying to explain stalin, and still trying to explain hitler.
Stalin makes top 12 in russias poll for all time hero – http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,473245,00.html
so the whole process of making up angles and pretending your intelligent (and doing what intelligentsia do), your just pretending your a leader of a movement in some small way and not the fodder for their ends.
so if you guys think that if you hear a great angle that is the truth… then your more soviet than american… you just dont know it.
Here at the Institute of Obamology we are tweaking our 2.0 simulation of Obama. We have found that by ratcheting up the anti-Americanism and transnationalism coefficients, a specific vector sum Vx can be calculated then converted into behavior Bx, which is most often a speech, i.e. Sx.
In layman’s terms, it’s not that Obama desires to cause suffering and evil in the world, with possible exceptions towards Republicans, conservatives, businessmen, and whites, but that he believes a weaker America is a better America and a safer America, resulting in a better, safer world.
Unfortunately Obama is testing his assumptions not in a simulation but in the real world.
Huxley says, “In layman’s terms, it’s not that Obama desires to cause suffering and evil in the world, with possible exceptions towards Republicans, conservatives, businessmen, and whites, but that he believes a weaker America is a better America and a safer America, resulting in a better, safer world.
Unfortunately Obama is testing his assumptions not in a simulation but in the real world.”
So–it’s not that he wants to cause suffering, and when he does it will be a side effect. Is that a distinction without a difference? Is it a bug or a feature?
And–more to the point–how on earth is relying on the Constitution and the electoral process going to shut this down? I’ve spoken to a few friends at work, and they are starting to think that by November 2010 it will be too late. I don’t like it, believe me. I’m getting to be an old lady. But alarm bells are going off. Quietly.
I already think I undertand Obama. I dont think its a choice between his being leftist, or slick, or naive and inexperienced… I think its plainly all three .
He is clearly a leftist in the Jeremiah Wright/Bill Ayers mold. Add to that a shameless glib ability to “hustle” akin to John Edwards. And lastly, a naivete that comes from never having done anything else beyond academia, “community organizing,” and campaigning.
His agenda is clearly leftist. But it is being implemented in a manner that does betray a certain level of naivete and inexperience… hence the sudden distrust that he has provoked, and the klutziness of some of his efforts, and his inability to easily get passed his pet “universal health care” project notwithstanding that the Dems control both houses of congress.
And its all filtered through his glibness: the one item in his tool shed that he has fully polished and learned how to use: this is what he got out of “community organizing” and academic BS sessions. He knows how to spread it think, essentially. But when being a BS artist, essentially a hustler, is your best skill, it simply doesnt result in the kind of concrete results which many of his supporters were expecting. In fact, it gets tiring after a while… hence his decreasing effectiveness, and lowered poll numbers. You can only talk your way into so much: there comes a point when a used car is obviously a “lemon,” notwithstanding the best efforts of the most articuolate used car salesman.
A lot of people are aware of the components of what maks up Obama: his leftism, his glibness, and his naivete/inexperience. Its just the weird effect that all three together have which is throwing people for a loop.
Correction:
undertand = understand
I loved this headline on the Weekly Standard blog:
Obama “Impatient” with 5,000 year-old Conflict
http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TWSFP/2009/09/obama_impatient_with_5000_year.asp
Another correction:
spread it think = spread it thick
CV, I had the same thought: “Bristling with impatience” – the perfect attitude with which to approach Middle East negotiations.
betsybounds: Although many here feel it’s pointless to understand Obama from the inside-out, I still find Obama an interesting mystery.
Motives do matter. Abraham Lincoln caused enormous suffering to Americans, especially Southern Americans. Still, we celebrate Lincoln as a great American because we understand why he did what he did.
I’m certainly not saying that Obama is a great American, but I think it matters whether he is a fiendish Manchurian Candidate determined to cripple America at any cost so his collectivist overlords can step in or whether he is a wounded boy who accepted the radical, anti-American assumptions of the radical milieu in which he grew up. Or whatever other model of Obama one wishes to posit.
I still find it weird and fascinating how we still don’t know who Obama is.
If you are worred about Obama, note that he is being stymied at every turn and on every front. Sure, he gets to make speeches on TV and at the UN, but he can’t pass his bills and he can’t get our friends or our enemies to cooperate with him.
What specifically are you worried about?
J.L. – What Hansen describes is chillingly reminiscenst of CS Lewis’s Screwtape and That Hideous Strength.
The doors of hell are locked from the inside.
Obama’s current grand speeches about climate change, nuclear disarmament, and the Middle East are perfect illustrations of Obama as a naive, radical academic as opposed to a relentless Leninist usurper.
Huxley, I am worried about what happens behind the scenes with who they fund etc and the back door laws such as the FCC diversity director is talking about, narrowly avoiding the acorn/census debacle etc.
I agree people are waking up and opposing many of his ideas, that’s good but we still need to be watchful.
Especially telling of his twisted world view was his reaction to the letter of the 7 CIA directors, “they are just trying to protect their agency” rather than the fact the prosocutions could damage the country.
Darrell: Yes, Obama will do some damage.
My point is that this damage, barring horrific WMD scenarios, is something the US can handle, given its Constitution, its institutions and its people.
Plus Obama is becoming weaker, not stronger, and I don’t see that changing unless the economy improves and that’s not happening either.
Unless the dollar completely collapses and hyper inflation begins, that could rush in some changes that can not be undone.
A) That sounds unlikely.
B) It can still be undone. Germany has been the economic powerhouse of Europe for decades now.
huxley,
Unfortunately for us, the economic turnaround in Germany was caused by a complete and unconditional embrace of Free Market Economics, and that doesn’t seem to be likely here in the good ol’ USA.
-G
“So—it’s not that he wants to cause suffering, and when he does it will be a side effect. Is that a distinction without a difference? Is it a bug or a feature?”
Yes, it makes a difference. We all make mistakes, though in this case it is a really big one. However few find it endearing for someone to ascribe malevolence to a mistake no matter how badly that mistake turned out to be.
It also makes a HUGE difference with respect to getting an understanding or policy change. I do not think that you are going to get either with Obama, he is too far into the leftist ideology but there are millions we can.
Those millions believe so out of ignorance – that is all they have ever learned because that is what our edumacational system teaches (and yes, that misspelling is intentional – I refuse to call it “education”). When you ascribe “you hate America” to that idea they are going to immediately buck up and write you off as a loon – after all they believe as such and they want the best for this country.
That is *exactly* what is driving a great deal of the Tea Party protests. Millions have heard the other person is a racist greedy bastard and for many years have sagely nodded their heads. For the first time they are the “greedy racist lying bastards” and they very well know they are not. Suddenly they are having to examine their actual believes and are finding a lot of things are simply wrong. It is truly a glorious thing to watch this many people wake up and this type of partisan bickering is why it isn’t helping the conservative movement much either.
This is why we want a “Big Tent” party – that *does not* mean you accept any ideology. It means you define your core beliefs (small govt, targeted spending, strong military/defense) and stick to that. Do not alienate the other side for no real reason.
There *are* people out there that do want to destroy what we are so they can rebuild it how they want and there is no reason to not point that out, but you better make sure you can back that up well. However Obama doesn’t seem to be one of those people so ascribing his actions to it makes one look like a loon. It is enough that his actions are going to result in that, there is no reason to add in some sinister reason.
Focus on that and you can win elections and affect a real change. Start in meaningless hyperbole and demonizing the opposition and you are going to loose too.
Huxley,
I don’t think it’s precisely pointless to try to understand Obama, and I agree that it must be interesting because, on the evidence, many people I’m inclined to respect bother to do it. I’m not quite ready to say that motives don’t matter, but they are not determinative either. I think we celebrate Lincoln as a great American because he managed to win at least as much as because we think his heart was in the right place. It’s worth noting that he fought the Civil War, according to his own explanations, because he thought the Union had to be preserved, not because he wanted to end slavery–it amounted to saying that once you had joined this club, you couldn’t be permitted to quit. Honorable people differ over whether this was or was not a good thing, but I don’t think it was self-evidently noble. While I don’t find his arguments totally persuasive, I think the writings of Melvin Bradford in this regard make some compelling points and can’t be dismissed out-of-hand.
I don’t for a moment think Obama is a Manchurian Candidate–he’s no one’s tool, pawn, or puppet. He may be a fully equal member of a group whose members share the same ends, but I don’t think anyone’s pulling his strings or playing him like a chess piece. I certainly don’t think he’s a sophomoric leftist idealist from the Academy. Having said that, I also think there’s a point beyond which it doesn’t matter what he is, except that he’s the President of the United States of America. Again, it could be a distinction without a difference.
The things I’m specifically afraid of form a fair list. I’ll content myself with a few generalizations, and hope I make the point.
I am afraid of a police state. I’m afraid of this because of the enforcement powers the executive branch already has (EPA, DEA, IRS, and all the other agencies) and the sense of mission to expand those powers its bureaucrats demonstrably possess. I am afraid of losing our freedoms, including speech and (selectively) religion, as part of all this. I am afraid of parents being afraid to speak freely in the presence of their own children. Their children, btw, are being indoctrinated as spies on their parents, beginning with environmentalist tripe and extending into other areas.
I am afraid of massive shortages of health care, food, power, and other goods and services, along with rationing.
I am afraid of severely curtailed freedom of movement in the name of perverted science. I am a scientist myself, with an advanced degree in geology, and I know something about the awful twisting of science that is being done in the name of global warming, or climate change, or whatever they are calling it now. That by itself would take me several posts to address. If we cannot have faith in science, we will have lost a mutually intelligible language. Science is about skepticism, and I don’t care how much alleged consensus there is regarding global warming–it’s not scientific. Science operates by ruling things out, and these guys pay no attention to that. Skepticism is the one essential mindset of a good scientist, it’s the engine that pulls the whole train. The Left wants to rule it unacceptable.
I am very afraid of the health care reform being advanced. I’m afraid of that most of all because it stands the greatest chance of being both extremely destructive and irreversible. I think Obama and the Congressional Left know that, and that’s why they have it on the front burner. Once it is in place, the private health care system will dissolve and will be irreplaceable.
I fear the marginalization of any real legislative opposition to the point of total irrelevance, and the subsequent electoral process corruption to the point where an entrenched majority simply assumes power.
I am very afraid of the international mess he is creating, most particularly with respect to Israel. I am and have been for many years a very strong supporter of Israel.
Somewhere in the darker reaches of my mind, I fear the French, Russian, Chinese, Cuban, and other Leftist Revolutions. No one ever thought those things could happen, and those body counts mount, in those countries and in those times, and yet they did. It’s true that we have many things going for us: an armed and reasonably well-informed public who are presumably willing to fight, while preferring not to, and a strong heritage of freedom and the mechanisms to retain it if we but have the will.
So far, I will grant you that Obama’s being slowed at many turns, and time will soon tell whether it actually adds up to being stymied or not. Maybe you are right and he will be stopped. But even then I don’t think it will be a permanent defeat–the Left is resilient and determined. They’ve slaughtered scores of millions of people, failed spectacularly to govern well in tens of countries, and still they do not give up. It came to me some time ago that they have their sights set upon the US because it’s a wealthy country, and they think the one thing they have lacked so far has been enough money. This interpretation of mine is somewhere between a guess and a rigorous analysis. Anyway they have come at us this time like parasites, from within. I don’t think they will admit defeat unless they are broken.
Unfortunately for us, the economic turnaround in Germany was caused by a complete and unconditional embrace of Free Market Economics, and that doesn’t seem to be likely here in the good ol’ USA.
Giles: I’d hardly call the German economic model the result of a “complete and unconditional embrace of Free Market Economics.” For instance, consider this wiki quote:
…the German model of a rigidly structured and regulated economy has become more attractive, as part of the financial crisis could be attributed to a lack of regulation associated with laissez-faire capitalism.
The US periodically tilts between the right and the left. I see no reason that it won’t tilt right again.
betsybounds: Thanks for writing all that out.
I worry about those things too. I fight and will continue to fight anything like those bleak futures.
Perhaps, I’m whistling past the graveyard but I just don’t see the United States anywhere near such bleak outcomes.
I could do a straight-line extrapolation from where we are now with Obama to those possibilities, but those straight-line predictions always fail because they leave out feedback and unexpected developments.
We are that feedback. We are the ones we have been waiting for … uh no, cancel that last bit.
LOL!
Far out, Huxley. You’ve brightened my day.
betsybounds: As must be obvious, I don’t like to head towards pessimism, but I do find the general embrace of global warming by scientists to be alarming.
I’m a software engineer who grew up revering science and scientists. I am profoundly disappointed and even a bit frightened that scientists could behave in such a herd-like, politicized manner.
I suppose I should know better. Scientists are just humans, driven by human needs for belonging and paychecks. Nonetheless.
What a maroon.
It sure would be nice if the Jews I know would learn something from this, but their brains have turned to mush. I no longer expect any new ideas from them. They will like Obama to the bitter end.
It’s funny. I told my children when they were growing up that they shouldn’t watch too much TV or their brains would turn to mush.
By golly, that’s exactly what happened. 🙁
Giles, huxley is right about the German economy. It’s only relatively free: more free than France, less free than, say, Ireland or Switzerland.
Great contributions, huxley. I agree with you that political resistance to Obama is only going to grow and will stop him before he does irreversible damage.
On the other hand, the G20 agenda seems to be designed to 1) limit international trade and 2) prevent the US from adequately funding our military to continue in its role of stabilizing the world system and preserving the balance of power in the various regions around the world. If that happens, the results will be highly destabilizing, leading to big wars.
Obama may mean well–somehow, in his own mind–but he is likely to end up getting a lot of people killed.
It’s going to be very difficult to undo the indoctrination our children are getting from the left via the public schools and universities. Check out this video being shown in schools. Did you know that the purpose of the government is to take care of us? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLBE5QAYXp8
It’s called The Story of Stuff, and it was exposed by Glenn Beck.
Betsy Bounds,
Thank you for that exhaustive list of things that trouble you. I, too, worry about all that and more. That said, I tend to agree with Huxley. Obama is managed to ram through the Porkulus and the Omnibus Spending bills, but since then there have been no successes. Cap and Trade, Healthcare Reform, Card Check, and other legislation are bogged down. The more Obama works to publicize his healthcare ideas the more he sticks his foot in his mouth. His speech to Congress was, as Joe Wilson asserted, about a fictional version of HR3200. He HASN’T READ THE BILL! And many people have picked up on that. His appearance at the UN today was……..pathetic. As Dick Armey said on Larry kudlow’s show today, “The man can talk, but he’s short on action.” In other words – a lot of smoke and no fire.
My way of fighting back is sending e-maills and telephoning my Congress critters. If enough people keep hammering away, it will have an effect. It is up to us, the citizens, to keep reminding our representatives that they work for us. Keep hammering them about their cadillac health plans. That is a sore spot. Even my liberal legislators are sensitive to being known as unwilling to eat their own cooking.
When the 2010 election campaign gets underway, I intend to work for good candidates and contribute as much money as I can afford. Maybe I am a cockeyed optimist, but I’ve met so many people at TEA Parties that are willing to stand up and be heard. I think the electorate, if given good candidates, will roar in 2010.
I could do a straight-line extrapolation from where we are now with Obama to those possibilities, but those straight-line predictions always fail because they leave out feedback and unexpected developments.
Feedback assumes The Bama cares what we think (he does not) and “unexpected developments” means “luck”. I hate counting on a happy accident to save my bacon.
It’s all fun ‘n’ games until Amnesty for Illegals entrenches a needy, illiterate democrat majority that wants to live in your house.
As must be obvious, I don’t like to head towards pessimism, but I do find the general embrace of global warming by scientists to be alarming.
“Optomism is cowardice” -Oswald Spengler.
Don’t worry, I’m sure everything will be “OK”! 🙂
and above i listed some of the appalling general knowlege of our republic the people have.
of course, all the answers are completely reasonable… that a nobody, no nothing, child of communists, friend of radicals and stalinists, no experience, rose up to the office of president promising in his own words fundemental change of the system, was naive, unlucky and incompetent…
that would mean that this naive incompetent has a huge army of people who have been assembled waiting for him.
acorn alone has 270 member organizations. anyone want to do some math as to acorn, seiu, tides, and more?
reasonablness can only be maintained if you are looking at parts and not the whole.
Posterized Barack
Pirate Commander and Thief
Mystery Solved
I don’t for a moment think Obama is a Manchurian Candidate—he’s no one’s tool, pawn, or puppet. He may be a fully equal member of a group whose members share the same ends, but I don’t think anyone’s pulling his strings or playing him like a chess piece.
I understand this perspective, which I share from time to time, but I keep coming back to Obama’s life story. Every obstacle, even potential obstacle, mysteriously fell away. Doors flew open before he had to knock. No setbacks, no reversals, no contretemps, no hitches. Just gliding from resume bullet point to resume bullet point. If he didn’t have anyone running interference for him, he’s led the most charmed life in human history.
And if he did, who were these people running interference for him, and why did they do so?
I guess my comment didn’t make too much sense. I was referring to Obama’s attempt to push Israel around. He’s the maroon.
I don’t think he’s going to get too far with the Israelis. They’ve been down this road before. Sure they may look like tiny little mice, but I bet they can think of a few things to do to embarrass Obama. If I can think of some things, they can think of them too.
Occam’s Beard . . .
You said, “If he didn’t have anyone running interference for him, he’s led the most charmed life in human history.
And if he did, who were these people running interference for him, and why did they do so?”
I think he did have people running interference for him. I said on a previous thread that I thought they could be (1) Russian, (2) Saudis, or (3) crazy malevolent evil people like George Soros.
Of course, there could be others, but these seem the most logical. What confuses me is the thought that these three elements, all so different, could be working together. That would be material for a novel. Could it actually happen?
Obama’s resume is just too peculiar. Sure, Mayor Daley could have backed him, but that doesn’t really seem like Daley’s style.
Promethea, I was addressing Betsy’s earlier post.
No need to posit foreigners as those running interference for Obama. I suspect that a network of homegrown leftists, of the ilk that helped leftist fugitives hide, have to be considered the frontrunners. Instead of Tinkers to Evers to Chance, I think it was Mom to Davis to unnamed folks at Occidental to Ayers to, ultimately, maybe Soros and/or similar vermin.
“Optomism is cowardice” -Oswald Spengler.
Don’t worry, I’m sure everything will be “OK”! 🙂
Gray: Mostly things have worked out for the better.
Spengler’s gloomy prognostications from early in the 2oth century have not panned out. The Decline of the West, like the reports of Mark Twain’s death, has been greatly exaggerated.
IMO, pessimism is cowardice. I said that.
The Israelis and Arabs don’t fully understand that Diversity is Strength.
Thus, they are not transfixed by the brilliance of Obama’s blackness.
Feedback assumes The Bama cares what we think (he does not)
Gray: No, Obama does not care what we think … except to the point where he can’t successfully put a gun to the head of every Blue Dog and pass ObamaCare.
Unless Obama has the big brass ones that some commenters here assume so that he can pull the trigger and declare himself El Supremo por Vida and make it stick, Obama is limited by what 50+% of America thinks.
I’m sure it bugs the hell out of him.
Obama may mean well—somehow, in his own mind—but he is likely to end up getting a lot of people killed.
Oblio: Yes, people will be killed.
For that matter, Americans and others in Afghanistan are being killed right now, and I’m pretty sure it’s for nothing other than Obama’s need to temporize a while longer before he bugs out of that country.
“History is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake.” — James Joyce
Occam’s Beard . . .
The reason I thought it might be foreigners is that apparently a Saudi paid for Obama’s tuition at Harvard or Columbia.
My conjecture about the Russians is based on knowing how clever the Soviets were in infiltrating U.S. institutions.
One of these days I’ll read the Venona papers. They must be fascinating.
Occam’s Beard Says:
September 23rd, 2009 at 11:02 pm
Exactly so. This no-talent twerp has never so much as run a hot dog stand, and he magically glides all the way into the Presidency. There is definitely more going on than meets the eye.
(And as I’ve said before, if something “untoward” were to happen to him, it will be because someone has decided that he has outlived his usefulness. Not because of right-wing “haters”, which the media seems to be busy preparing us to think.)
I don’t think anyone becomes POTUS without a intriguing contingent of backers in the shadows.
Nonetheless, Obama didn’t magically glide into the presidency. He could easily have lost that election were it not for the economic meltdown and other factors.
In fact I’ll boldy predict that Obama’s presidency will be a disaster that the Democratic Party, the Baby Boomers, George Soros and whatever figures in the shadows there may be, will be living down for a long, long time.
” What confuses me is the thought that these three elements, all so different, could be working together.”
It’s a cultural thing, always has been, where my enemy’s enemy is my friend, until they outlive their usefulness…
Obama = Mussolini with a tan.
O will never see a train run on time; what an arrogant, pretentious prick that man is.
Former UN Representative, John Bolten, was not only annoyed with the President’s attempts at Palestinian-Israeli moral equivalency, but was shocked and perplexed that Obama’s rhetoric concerning Jewish settlements seemed to include ALL settlements since 1967 last night on FOX News’s Greta Van Sustren.
Former National Security Advisor, Zbigniew Brzezinski, roundly criticized President Obama for announcing policy on Israel without having any follow-up this morning on MSNBC’s ‘Morning Joe’.
Spot on. I’m alarmed by this campaign alleging “right-wing ‘haters’ are creating an atmosphere of violence, and will be responsible for any that takes place” for precisely this reason. It sounds like North Korean statements of similar ilk.
Occam’s Beard says
I understand this perspective, which I share from time to time, but I keep coming back to Obama’s life story. Every obstacle, even potential obstacle, mysteriously fell away. Doors flew open before he had to knock. No setbacks, no reversals, no contretemps, no hitches. Just gliding from resume bullet point to resume bullet point. If he didn’t have anyone running interference for him, he’s led the most charmed life in human history.
Obama is “Jackie”:
If I could be for only an hour
If I could be for an hour every day
If I could be for just one little hour
Cute, cute, cute in a stupid-ass way
http://www.stlyrics.com/j/jacquesbrelisaliveandwellandlivinginparis.htm
Obama Mentions Himself Nearly 1,200 Times in 41 Speeches (Or Did You Not Notice?)
Dan Gainor has a spicy little piece that pretty much sums up Narcissist-in-Chief Obama, the quintessential product of the I-My-Me culture:
In mythology, Narcissus was the guy who fell in love with his own reflection.
In 2009, he’s the president of the United States.
Instead of adoring his own image, Obama loves to hear himself talk — about himself. In just 41 speeches so far this year, not including this week’s big speech at the United Nations, Obama has talked about himself nearly 1,200 times — 1,198 to be exact. (That breaks down to 1,121 “I”s and just 77 “me”s.) And that just includes 34 weekly addresses and his seven major speeches. Count the hundreds of other public speeches and he’d be off the charts.
Mr. Gainor should be praised for this numeric feat of true heroism. It must have been stomach-turning. Not even the unprecedented wall-to-wall Sunday talk-show circus escaped his scrutiny. Despite that glaring hole right around the Fox affiliates, The Narcissinator still set records:
The interviews went off as expected. Obama kept his “I” on the nation’s problems. He mustered 387 personal mentions in just 82 minutes of air time. Forget the economy, health care, racism or whatever. Every 13 seconds, Obama was talking about … Obama.
If a first-person pronoun falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, would it make a difference in the polls?
and zelaya return is following a classic coupe.
1-he sneaks in
2-the crowds go wild attacking people
3-he steps out and calms them
4-he becomes despotic leader
1 and 2 are done…
3 is being worked on by his thugs…
When our government’s allies in Honduras – the ones who support Mel Zelaya’s attempted communist coup – found out the Hugo Chavez wannabe was back in the country, they ran riot:
After several weeks of relative peace and calm in Honduras – and no curfews, despite what the international media consistently misreports – former president Mel Zelaya returned to Honduras Monday and instigated violence again.
Virtually every private car in the area of the Brazilian Embassy where Zelaya is hiding was damaged by breaking out some or all of the windows and ruining the tires. Ironically, Mel Zelaya’s own mother’s car was parked on the street and was likewise vandalized.
Private homes in the area were broken into and robbed. Citizens were assaulted. Death threats were sprayed unto neighbors’ walls. Mountains of trash were strewn in the streets.
At least one woman’s house was completely ransacked, robbed, and her two employees were terrorized. The Zelayistas smoked marijuana as they destroyed and smashed everything in her house up to and including the ceilings, doors, and windows – the video of her home shown on the news was horrifying. Other neighbors were terrorized, assaulted, threatened with rape, and forced to prepare food by the rioters while they were being robbed. …
Damage was not limited to that area. Roads were blocked. Tires were burned.
This police vehicle was burned. At least one bus was vandalized. Banks, businesses, and government offices were similarly vandalized and robbed. Employees of one fast food restaurant were threatened by Zelayistas with burning the building down with them inside.
Stores were destroyed and robbed of everything, up to and including refrigerators, washers, dryers, and computers. A bank branch was robbed of L. 500,000.
The security doors for Dispensa Familiar were torn down and the store was sacked of everything from groceries to televisions. Anything that wasn’t stolen was destroyed. This photo shows just one example of the result of Zelaya’s ‘peaceful’ demonstrations.